Ella Snyder (born October 7, 18??) [1] was an American actress. [2] She was active in theaters in London and New York City and on the American vaudeville circuit during the 1890s and 1900s. She was known for her appearances in musicals on the West End and Broadway.
A native of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Ella Snyder began her career as an actress in a small role in the original Broadway production of Gustave Kerker's The Bell of New York at the Casino Theatre in 1897. [3] She continued with that production when it transferred to London's West End at the Shaftesbury Theatre; portraying Marjorie May in the UK premiere of that work in April 1898. [4] By the following September she had taken over the lead role of Mamie Clancy in the production. [5] Kerker composed new duets for her to sing with actor Frank Lawton for the London production. [6] The London American Register critic wrote the following about her performance:
Miss Ella Snyder who enacts the role of a rowdy, good hearted, affectionate, active Pell Street girl, one "Mamie Clancy", is a capital actress, and thoroughly realizes the character she is entrusted with. She is, moreover, a comely damsel with an intelligent face capable of quick changes in dramatic expression." [5]
Snyder remained with The Belle of New York production when it left London to return to Broadway's Casino Theatre in January 1900; still in the role of Mamie Clancy. [7] She went on to star in several more Broadway musicals staged as the Casino Theatre including the roles of Roxy Rocks in the original production of The Casino Girl (1900), Laura Lee in the revival of The Casino Girl (1901), [8] Sleeping Beauty in The Sleeping Beauty and the Beast (1901–1902), [9] and Dolly Wagner in Fascinating Flora (1907). [10] She was also a vaudeville performer. [1]
Snyder returned to London multiple times during her career. She was once again at the Shaftesbury Theatre in April through June 1900 as Dottie Muffett in Kerker's An American Beauty. [11] Soon after she starred opposite Richard Carle at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in A Condensed Comic Opera. [12] She was once again at the Shaftesbury Theatre from November 1900 through January 1901 as Roxy Rocks in the London production of The Casino Girl. [13] In 1902 she created the role of Mary Methuen in the original production of The Girl from Kays at London's Apollo Theatre. [14]
Two photographs of Ella Snyder are included in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery, London. [15]
Gabrielle Ray was an English stage actress, dancer and singer, best known for her roles in Edwardian musical comedies.
The Belle of New York is a musical comedy in two acts, with book and lyrics by Hugh Morton and music by Gustave Kerker, about a Salvation Army girl who reforms a spendthrift, makes a great sacrifice and finds true love.
Gustave Adolph Kerker, sometimes given as Gustav or Gustavus Kerker, was a Kingdom of Prussia-born composer and conductor who spent most of his life in the United States. He became a musical director for Broadway theatre productions and wrote the music for a series of operettas and musicals produced on Broadway and in the West End. His most famous musical was The Belle of New York (1897).
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is a musical with a book by Joseph Fields and Anita Loos, lyrics by Leo Robin, and music by Jule Styne, based on the best-selling 1925 novel of the same name by Loos. The story involves an American woman's voyage to Paris to perform in a nightclub.
Ethel Jackson was a United States actress and comic prima donna of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She appeared in Broadway theatrical productions, creating the title role in the original Broadway production of The Merry Widow.
Virginia Earle was an American stage actress remembered for her work in light operas, Edwardian musical comedies and vaudeville over the decades surrounding the turn of the 20th century.
The Casino Theatre was a Broadway theatre located at 1404 Broadway and West 39th Street in New York City. Built in 1882, it was a leading presenter of mostly musicals and operettas until it closed in 1930.
Caroline Maria Lupton, known professionally as Marie Studholme, was an English actress and singer of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, known for her supporting and sometimes starring roles in Edwardian musical comedy. Her attractive features made her one of the most popular postcard beauties of her day.
Truly Shattuck was a soubrette star of vaudeville, music halls, and Broadway whose career began in tragedy and ended in relative obscurity.
Charles Morton Stewart McLellan (1865–1916) was a London-based American playwright and composer who often wrote under the pseudonym Hugh Morton. McLellan is probably best remembered for the musical The Belle of New York and drama Leah Kleschna.
Louise Gunning was an American soprano popular on Broadway in Edwardian musical comedy and comic opera from the late 1890s to the eve of the First World War. She was perhaps best remembered as Princess Stephanie of Balaria in the 1911 Broadway production of The Balkan Princess. During the war years Gunning began to close out her career singing on the vaudeville circuit.
Robert Armand René Michaelis was a French-born actor and singer who worked in musical theatre, mainly in England, but he also made appearances on Broadway.
Madge Lessing was a British stage actress and singer, panto principal boy and postcard beauty of Edwardian musical comedy who had a successful career in the West End in London, Europe and on Broadway from 1890 to 1921 and who made a number of early film appearances in Germany for director Max Mack.
Marie George was an American actress, singer and stage beauty who had a successful career first in New York City and later in London, England during the Edwardian era.
The Belle of Bohemia is an Edwardian musical comedy in two acts with music by Ludwig Engländer and Harry Truman MacConnell and lyrics and musical book by Harry B. Smith. The musical opened on Broadway in 1900 before having a run on the West End of London in 1901. It was one of a series of musicals with Belle in the title that were popular on both sides of the Atlantic in the Edwardian era.
The Casino Girl is an Edwardian musical comedy in two acts. The story concerns a former chorus girl at the Casino Theatre in New York, who flees to Cairo under an assumed name to escape amorous advances of an admirer.
Louis Harrison was an actor, playwright, comedian, lyricist, librettist, and theatre director. As both a performer and playwright, he was mainly active within the genres of musical theatre and light opera.
Ernest Albert, born Ernest Albert Brown, was an American painter, illustrator, muralist, and scenic designer. He was a prolific scenic designer, first in St. Louis and Chicago and then on Broadway. He is considered a major American landscape painter and was elected the first president of the Allied Artists of America in 1919.
D. Frank Dodge was an American scenic designer who had a prolific career on Broadway from the 1890s into the early 1920s. Theatre historian Gerald Bordman in The Concise Oxford Companion to American Theatre stated that Dodge was "one of the busiest turn‐of‐the‐century set designers" who "specialized in colorful settings for musicals".
The Sleeping Beauty and the Beast is a musical in three acts with music by J. M. Glover and Frederick Solomon and lyrics by J. Cheever Goodwin. It's book by John J. McNally and Goodwin was adapted from the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane's 1900 pantomime of the same name by J. Hickory Wood and Arthur Collins. The musical also included additional music and lyrics by the song writing team of Jean Schwartz and William Jerome, and by the African-American creative team of Bob Cole, James Weldon Johnson, and J. Rosamond Johnson.